


Neighbors

by LadyBookwormWithTeeth



Series: NSFW Drabble Meme Challenge [5]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: AU, Bondage, Consent Issues, F/M, Greek Mythology - Freeform, Nudity, Nymphs & Dryads, Rumbelle - Freeform, Touching, Vines, thorns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-15
Updated: 2015-11-15
Packaged: 2018-05-01 17:33:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5214599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyBookwormWithTeeth/pseuds/LadyBookwormWithTeeth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mr. Gold tries to get rid of an ugly tree. In doing so, he starts a fight with the Nymph that lives there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Neighbors

**Author's Note:**

> So I've just found out Belle wouldn't be considered a Nymph, but a Dryad (a tree Nymph). Sorry for not being as accurate as I should be.
> 
> Beta: MaddieBonanaFana, as always!

This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be. Gold had to be delusional, or downright insane. But the vines that had wrapped themselves around his wrists and ankles felt real, thin little things with a surprisingly strong grip. He thought he’d be able to pull them apart, but the more he struggled, the more fierce their grasp became.

And then there was the woman, who didn’t even look real, although he almost wished she were. She stood over him, naked and unashamed, so that his eyes could feast upon her freely. Maybe modesty should have made him look the other way, but he couldn’t help it. She was beautiful, every inch of her. The way the morning light shone on her skin made it look as smooth as a marble sculpture.

She was staring down at him, brown curls covering her youthful face, blue eyes passing quickly over his body, examining him. Had she not stepped out of that ugly tree, Gold wouldn’t have found the whole situation to be nearly as bad.

“I must be dreaming,” he muttered, watching the woman as she stood there, unmoving, observing him.

Then, her toes poked him in the ribs. The touch was soft, but it still made him squirm away as much as the vines let him, hissing, “Hey!”

“Be still,” she said. A velvet voice. English, with some sort of accent he couldn’t place.

The command alone was enough to make his blood boil. Whatever this girl was it didn’t matter. No one broke into his property to give him orders and poke at him. He pulled at the vines again.

“I said be still,” she repeated, not even looking him in the eye. Despite the softness in her voice, she did not sound amused.

Gold ignored her nonetheless and tried to wrap his fingers around the vines. Maybe if he got a strong grasp, he could uproot them. As he twisted on the ground, growling at the girl, the pressure on his wrists and ankles grew stronger, and this time he could feel something sharp prickling his skin.

He looked at the girl, angry. She didn’t bother to look at him.

“Let me go!”

She rolled her eyes and waited patiently.

The vine on his right ankle rolled itself higher, a long row of thorns scratching his skin on its way. He kicked and writhed on the ground. There hadn’t been thorns before. Where did they come from?

“You’re doing this!” he shouted at the girl. She kept her face turned to the sun, a lazy smile spreading on her face as she enjoyed the heat. “Stop it!”

“Stop being difficult,” she said, as soft as ever.

Gold struggled and cursed. One vine found its way underneath his sleeve, to prickle and scratch his arm.

“I don’t have to make this painful,” she said, finally turning to face him. “But I will. So if I were you, I’d do as I say and be still.”

He snarled at her, as if that alone would be enough to send her off running.

Instead, the vines held on tighter and the thorns became sharper.

She stared down at him, utterly indifferent to his discomfort.

“Fine!” he shouted, willing himself to stop fighting. Since every fiber of his being wanted to either tore at the vines or scratch his own skin, it wasn’t easy, but as soon as he stood still, the thorns retreated. Her tendrils, however, didn’t move, holding him in place.

“There. Was that so difficult?”

He glared at her and her condescending tone. It was enough to make him try to jump off the ground, but the memory of the thorns was enough to keep him still.

“What are you?” he asked.

She threw the question right back at him. “What are  _you_? You look like them, but…” her toes poked at his ribs again. “They didn’t wear so many layers. Sometimes, they didn’t wear anything at all when they came to find me. Neither did they have such foul intentions.”

She gave his ax, now abandoned on the floor, an angry look.

“You’re trespassing,” he hissed. “This is my property.”

“Is it?” she said, turning her torso around to look at the garden. “Looks like a forest to me. Although, did forests change too, along with your kind?”

He didn’t know what to say.

She knelt by his side. Despite the situation, he couldn’t deny she was as graceful as she was beautiful. He could see her collarbone now, sharp and inviting underneath her skin. And she breathed, just like a regular woman would, her chest rising to the rhythm of her breath.

“What a curious thing you’ve become,” she said, staring at him as if  _he_  were the most fascinating thing in the garden.

When her hand crawled under his shirt, she barely brushed his skin, but it was enough to make him jolt away. The vines held him in place, though, giving him no choice but to wait for her to release him.

She seemed more interested in the fabric of his shirt than his body, though.

“Do all of you dress like this now?” she asked. “Isn’t this hot? It’s such a warm morning.”

She looked up at the sun again, but left her hand exactly where it was as she reveled in the heat.

“I missed warm mornings. I missed the sun.” She sighed. “I slept for so long.”

“You were asleep,” Gold said, repeating her words in hopes that they would make sense. Or, at the very least, help him ignore the hand that continued to stroke his shirt and, as consequence, his stomach. “You were asleep inside my tree.”

“Your tree?” she repeated, confused, turning to face him again.

“It belongs to me.”

She stared at him.

He explained, “It is in my property. It belongs to me.”

Her mouth formed a perfect O, as if she understood what he meant. It seemed to amuse her.

“Does everything in your property belong to you?” she asked.

Good. An easy question, for once.

“Yes.”

Without warning, she straddled his stomach, making him gasp.

“Do you think that I belong to you?”

He gulped. Her weight was light on his body, but even through his shirt he could feel her, warm and smooth, just like he had imagined. Gold kept his eyes on hers, even though it wasn’t easy. Her stare was piercing, demanding. And all he wanted was to look at her breasts. Her belly. Her smooth sex, now parted and pressing down on him.

"You’re different,” he rasped.

“Why?”

“You are a person.”

She giggled. “I am really not.”

He frowned at her.

“You had a name for me,” she said, trying to remember. “A name for my kind. So long ago. Nymph. Yes. You called me nymph.” She leaned closer, making Gold retrieve back. If he could, he’d have merged with the earth like she had once merged with the tree. “You used to love me once. You didn’t try to kill me with your axes.”

“I wasn’t trying to kill you,” he said. “I wasn’t supposed to know there was a mythological creature living in that ugly tree.”

“Is this why you were trying to kill me? You dislike my tree?”

Gold gave said tree a side glance. It looked nothing like the nymph that was currently straddling his body. There was no beauty there. It was old and twisted, it’s bark a pale color that only seemed to fade in the sun – whereas the Nymph seemed to glow in it. It didn’t have leaves anymore, not even in the Spring, and it only served two purposes: to block the sun from reaching the porch in the back of his cabin, and to disgust him. How did something so ugly manage to hide someone so beautiful.

Gold answered, “I dislike your tree very much.”

“Well, I dislike your-” she looked at the cabin. Grimaced. “Do you live in those now?”

That was something! Being criticized by a naked girl who lived inside a tree. And not even a nice tree, at that.

“The property is mine,” he said, making her turn back to face him. “Take your ugly tree and move somewhere else.”

“You have become arrogant and shallow,” she said, and Gold could feel the thorns growing again. He stood very still, but he could still feel them prickling his skin. The vines wrapped themselves higher up his legs. The ones on his wrists found the spaces between his fingers, tender, sensitive flesh to tease.

“Stop it!” he hissed, starting to squirm again. The pull of the tendrils became vicious, stretching him, making it impossible to move.

“I’ve been here long before you built that-” she threw the cabin a dirty look. “-that  _thing_.”

“I said  _stop it_!”

“You will leave my tree alone,” she ordered, leaning closer to him. “And if you ever come near me with that ax-”

“What?” he snarled, pushing himself up the best he could to meet her halfway. She didn’t seem to find the effort threatening.

“My thorns will be the least of your problems.”

Gold stared into the Nymph’s eyes. At the moment, trapped by vines and scratched by an endless line of thorns, he couldn’t think of anything more maddening. But the look on her face was menacing, and if she claimed there was anything worse than the torture she was imposing on him now, he believed her.

“Now go back home,” she said, “and do not bother me.”

The Nymph pulled away and got up, her movements fast but graceful. Although she had knelt on the ground, there was no dirt on her legs or knees, her skin unspoiled by the dirt. She turned around and pressed her back against the ugly tree, letting it swallow her body. It was only when she was vanished that the vines finally set him free.

Gold rushed away from the lifeless tendrils, fearing they might come to life at any moment, but they didn’t. Her spell was broken.

All that was left for him to do was to watch the tree, questioning his sanity, with nothing left as proof but the tiny marks on his skin, which he rubbed repeatedly. The itch she had left behind was very real.


End file.
